Love and fury

In the week when the “devil” was jailed for the mur­der of his girl­friend, an­other young woman died, al­legedly at the hands of her for­mer boyfriend.

On Thurs­day Sandile Mantsoe, de­scribed as a “devil in dis­guise” by the judge, was sen­tenced in the High Court in Jo­han­nes­burg to 32 years be­hind bars for killing 22-year-old Karabo Mokoena.

Two days ear­lier Zolile Khu­malo’s for­mer boyfriend, Tha­bani Mzolo, was ar­rested for her mur­der in Dur­ban.

The two women are sta­tis­tics of femi­cide, an in­ter­na­tional scourge in which South Africa fea­tures promi­nently.

The World Health Or­gan­i­sa­tion would clas­sify the deaths as “in­ti­mate femi­cide” — a mur­der “com­mit­ted by a cur­rent or for­mer hus­band or boyfriend”.

A 2012 WHO re­port found: “Pre­lim­i­nary find­ings of a study by the WHO and the Lon­don School of Hy­giene and Trop­i­cal Medicine show that more than 35% of all mur­ders of women glob­ally are re­ported to be com­mit­ted by an in­ti­mate part­ner. In com­par­i­son, the same study es­ti­mates that only about 5% of all mur­ders of men are com­mit­ted by an in­ti­mate part­ner.”